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HTC Desire S

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The HTC Desire S is a high end android smart phone, which is packed with features and altogether very well made. User interface isn't as intuitive or reliable as the iPhone, but the price difference is considerable. „

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Excellent phone, would recommend.

I've had this phone for model for 18 months now and I love it.

This phone is a good size and the battery lasts me for at least a whole day - and I am quite a heavy user of apps. Turning off the autosync is recommended to extend the battery life though. The camera is easy to use and produces good quality, clear, images and has a few settings that you can play with. The music player is excellent.

The Android market has some excellent apps, mostly free. There are already some default HTC apps on the phone which are useful for syncing with Facebook, Twitter, Google and other such accounts.

The HTC easily syncs with my laptop and netbook using both Windows Media Player and Media Go.

There's also the added bonus that it charges when attached to either a computer or the wall, and the wall adapter works with other devices as well, including my Kindle and mp3 player.

I have only had two problems with it: the headphones provided with it are uncomfortable and too big for my ears. Also, the phone is not very forgiving if you drop it and I've had to replace it twice because the screen has become loose.

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I have had this phone for nearly two years. The camera is great in good light, not so good in artificial light. The apps available to Android are good, and run really well. The phone needs charging once a day, it get quite hot after about 20 minutes continuous use. After almost two years the alarm often fails, although works again if set up in a different box. The internet can freeze sometimes, although if I turn airplane mode on and off again it's enough to give the internet a jolt. It's very robust and has survived my 3 and 6 year olds! Overall, a lovely little phone that has done well for me over the past two years of my children's lives and has storage for enough photo's for this happy snapper.

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great phone would recommend to a friend.

I got this phone 17 months ago on a 24 month contract with 3, on the one plan.

I have been really happy with the phone, it has a really fast processor and quickly loads up web pages.I really liked the size of the screen which is just over 3 an half inches. and is very clear and bright and has really vivid and strong colours.

the phone has a 5 mp camera which takes fantastic pics and is very clear when making video calls, the video camera mode also takes crisp and clear videos, with great clear sound.

my phone came with android 2.1, but I was able to update it 6 months ago thanks to HTC so it is now running Android jellybean 4.2. the update was very easily done with clear and precise instructions from HTC.

There is a very strong wifi on it and it is easy to setup so that it connects to your home broadband when you are at home which saves your data usage if you aren't on an unlimited data plan.

the Bluetooth feature is really good for connecting to other devices and for connecting to you car if it has buit in Bluetooth for hands free driving.

it has loads of ringtones and wallpapers, and has loads of space for all your apps and widgets and shortcuts.it is really good for texting, and you can make the text boxes bigger so that they are easier to read and reply to.

the screen has the feature of pinch to zoom, which means you can make the text on your screen bigger when you are web browsing.

it also has built in GPS which allows you to use the phone as a sat nav in your car or when walking around.

the battery life is pretty much the same as most smart phones nowadays, you should get about just over a day out of it before you need to charge it, depending on how your using it, i.e, wifi and GPS will use the battery more when switched on.

the only negative thing that I've noticed lately, is that when I put the phone on silent and then browse the internet, when I finish using the internet the volume has gone back up to full again, which isn't a problem now that I know to look out for that happening, it might be just a little software fault with it, but it is nearly 2 years old now so there is not point worrying about it now.

I would recommend this phone and would buy another.

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Really great phone, android app - wonderful phone

My son got this beautiful HTC on s 2 year contract via Carphone warehouse, on Orange network.. to be honest it was seriously, seriously impressive.The quality of the photo's are second to none... obviously like all youngsters he is Facebook and Twitter mad and takes pictures of everything and uploads them for all his friends. The quality of these pictures are absolutely brilliant. If you only had this phone as a camera you would be highly impressed.The phone itself wasn't too hard to use either, it runs on Android and is quite user friendly - at the time of ordering this phone he paid £30, but this was a couple years ago now and I think it is probably much cheaper on a contract, if not free..Texts, calls and emails, are all very straightforward once you are used to Android - I personally am a bit slow with this system, but for that I blame myself not the phone, as the rest of our family use this phone with total ease. Mobile internet is very easy too, FB and Twitter as well as googling and general surfing. My son set the phone up to connect to our home Wifi, as the 3G in our home rural area is not too good, and he uses the internet at home with ease.

Unfortunately just at the very end of the contract the phone stopped working, a software problem - it now only half loads and then freezes. I do not know if it can be repaired, as the insurance he took out then started covering his new phone, so I am not inclined to pay out on this phone as it would just be for an extra - but in summary, when this phone was working, it was absolutely superb...

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The HTC Desire S is a good all round android phone.

Before HTC, i had never used a touch screen phone, and when purchasing the HTC Desire S on my vodphone contract, I relied totally on my partner to show me the ropes. It didn't take too long for me to discover the joys of the HTC Desire S. Firstly, it is a handy size to fit into my bag, which is important for a woman. The phone comes with a full user guide built in to th phone and there is more than one home screen so applications can be kept on the home screens of your choosing for easy access just by swiping left to right.

All the contents of the HTC can be accessed through the settings application, where the phone can be personalized to your liking, including a range of wallpapers, skins and widget to show your favourite content on the home screen. Wireless and networks, call, sound, display, accounts and sync, location, search and privacy sections are all within the Settings app.

The screen is sharp and crisp and the brightness can be adjusted to your liking as well as screen timeout and a flash LED light for notifications, all found within the Display section of the Settings app. It comes with an inbuilt front facing, 5 mega pixels camera with auto focus and LED flash, and a camcorder which gives excellent picture and sound quality, with sharp clean video footage.

Numerous apps are included, such as flashlight, fm radio, news, navigation, soundhound, and reader, amongst many others. The reader is fabulous, because it includes books already built into the phone. Downloading new applications is an easy process and they do download fairly quickly. With built in GPS it is excellent for people on the go.

I downloaded double twist onto the phone for playing my Mp3's and the sound quality is excellent. Ear phones are provided which are of suitable quality.

I do like that the phone can store not only contacts phone numbers, but offers easy editing to change numbers etc. I have a couple of gripes with the HTC Desire S. One is the battery. I find i am charging it virtually every day. If accessing the internet, the battery runs down very quickly. When switching the telephone off, it can take up to 4 minutes for it to turn back on to the home screen.

All in all though, i enjoy this phone. I am sure there are lots of aspects of the contents of the phone that i have not covered in this review as i tend to use only those i need, and have not delved into alot of the contents of the phone. I would, however, recommend it.

This review will also be available on ciao under flashjules123

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I would not buy another HTC product after dealing with this phone.

I finally got my hands on a HTC Desire S after a few years. Excited for the Android OS (And all its app glory), I was finally able to play some decent games! However, after a while, I noticed some annoying things, like white light escaping from the black borders and dirt getting stuck between the phone and screen. Then, my phone froze, prompting me to pull out the battery and put it back in. Then, it doesn't start up, getting stuck at the HTC logo for over 24 hours (I left it on for that long). After sending it to warranty (1 - 2 weeks: quite quick for warranty), I realized that I got a new phone, a one for one exchange. All is fine right now, although I got it around 5 months ago. The phone takes forever to start up, in my case, taking like 3 - 5 minutes. While all my other friends are using Samsung S3s or iPhones, I noticed that HTC was not releasing new firmware for the Desire S. So while my friends with the S3s are running the latest version of Android (Jellybean I believe), I'm running Gingerbread. The HTC Sense is also not to my taste, looking awkward. Then, there is this annoying bug where my phone shuts off randomly and sometimes during a call. A lot of the times, after a call, the phone remains on, but the display stops working and I get this black screen with the home button and other 3 buttons still working. The apps that use the camera also glitches (I am certain that the culprit is the camera, other phones are fine). The camera just can't focus. It focuses, then unfocuses and then refocuses and then on and on and on.

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The best phone I've ever had and I don't feel the need to upgrade any time soon!

This was the first phone I committed to with a contract plan instead of previously choosing to only use cheap phones and have pay as you go price plans. I haven't regretted it one bit since purchasing it nearly a year ago.

It's light, slim and fits perfectly in both hand and pocket. It has a large screen, almost the entire size of the front of the phone so it is great for all the standard things such as sending texts and making phone calls but it also enables you to view webpages easily and videos are big enough to see all detail. Nothing is lost in translation through this phone and I've found it to be so helpful.It has all the basic apps you'll need at first such as a calendar, calculator and news apps with the capability to add more of your own choices from the Play store.You can now find nearly all apps available on the Android market that you would get on an Apple product so for something that runs like an iPhone but costs nothing near to what you'd pay for an iPhone, this is your best bet!

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All in all this phone is a fantastic phone for a great price. It'll do what you'd expect and more.

Are the words you're looking for to describe this phone, everything about it justifies the price point. It packs a large amount of power in a lightweight, compact and cool phone.It fits in the palm nicely and the Super-LCD screen on the phone works its charm, never again will you be seeing jagged edges on text, colour bleeding, or lighting that's far too harsh.The phone itself support SDHC (which is currently the industry standard for Micro-SD) up to 32Gb, meaning you'll have plenty of space for your files, videos and music.The phone being Android offers various utilities as you'd expect, such as being able to act as a WiFi hotspot through a 3G connection, and through the use of apps, enabling you to use your existing WiFi connection through USB on your computer.#

However the phone does have its flaws, although it does have support for every band of WiFi, it doesn't seem to get as great of a WiFi signal as you would with other devices (especially so compared to my Nintendo 3DS which gets a signal all throughout the household), so Access Point placement is going to be key, but if you're paying for a plan which includes unlimited 3G networking then this probably won't be too big of an issue.Also the internal space isn't very good either, at around 250mb, this is easily solved with a Micro-SD card though as you can move all your files and apps onto there.And finally the issue is battery life, you'll get enough for a full day out of the battery provided you're not calling all day or using WiFi, which seems to take up most of the battery fairly quickly.

But all this aside, if you're looking for a great phone for a modest price, then this could be the phone for you!

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Quality phone

I have had this phone for about 6 months and I havent yet experienced any problems. The android system is quick to respond and the display is clear and sharp. As for the size of the device, I've found it is just about right, it is easy to hold without being to big. It manages to have screen size of 3.7 inches which is just about right for use of a touch screen system. The battery life is one concern as it will need to be charged about once a day otherwise it will cut out. It also has good sound quality which is important to me and I believe I made the right choice in this respect. One issue I do have is that the screen is easy made greasy from it being touch activated so i would advice a screen protector to be bought as this will maintain the clarity for a much longer period. In conclusion I would recommend this phone to everyone as it is good value for money and very reliable. One last plus side is that the phone can run the new android 4.0 system which will mean it will hold its value and be able to run the latest features.

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My next phone will be an HTC

Had this phone for a year now, have had no problems with it. The phone is used for the basics phoning texting, but also reading books, GPS, games, video, photos, networking apps and listning to mp3's. All in all this phone gives me about 7 peaces of equipment in one handy pocket sized piece of kit.There are lots of apps out there that work great on this phone one of my favourates is the Amazon app, this allows me to read books anywhere and anytime books are cheap and also loads of free ones available, the GPS takes a while to connect and can disconnect on cloudy days but im sure thats not only HTC that has this problem. games work fast and no gliches graphics are of a very high standard, video quality is also superb, not full HD sound is also good quality. 8 megapixal camera gives good result, with face detection and other cool features. Networking apps work well, but unfortunately the facebook app has crashed on me several times. battery life is generally good but running apps will drain this a lot faster. I would definitely purchase another.

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Good smart phone.

Ive had my HTC desire S now for just over a year and I think on the whole I have been impressed but there are a few niggles with it.

Appearance:So it looks slick. IT is relatively small but the screen fills almost the whole phone. I have the black edition but my Mom has the white and they both look glossy and lovely. Under the screen are 4 touch buttons that you use to control the phone and it has a camera front and back. The charger is great as you can disconnect the plug to use just the USB to charge.

Useability / Features:These are good. You can choose which applications to put on your front screen including the usual personalisation of putting a photo as your wallpaper. There are four screens you can scroll to so you can split your apps in whichever way you like.

The apps all have icons similar to the iphone and are stored on one page in alphabetical order so are easy to find. I find the market store on the HTC easy to navigate round and download what you need.

Camera:The camera is great as it has a flash which is what I will look for on any camera I buy in the future. I have over 300 photos and 20 videos stored at the moment on there so the memory is great.

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Ok so this phone does the same as most other smart phones on the market so you can set it up to connect with your twitter, facebook and emails easily. My disadvantage is that searching people is not particularly easy as it group all of your facebook contacts in and the search options are not great.

My huge disadvantage with this phone though is charge time. It is great you can fully charge the phone in under an hour but the charge goes down really quickly and I find myself charging it almost every day. After using a nokia for years on end which would last a week, this is highly annoying.

All in all though the phone is good for somebody who doesnt use phones to their full potential like me and also good for somebody who does like my husband. I just wish they would sort out the charge.

Kate.

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not a terrific phone unfortunalty

i gained my htc after upgrading from a nokia phone and to begin with i loved it...all the different features that my nokia just didnt have.however, in the 10 months i have had it it has been back to htc 4 times to be repaired, which i believe is a sign of a problematic phone, and to be honest i can not wait to upgrade again.As for the features half of them i dont really understand, and as you can not always totally "kill" all taks the battery life diminishes over 6-8 months, however downloading a task killer did start to help with this.The screen content is good however, and you can personalise the home screens, the ringtones are ok, and all the normal standard functions are adequate.The android market i would rate better than the iphone one, just purly that a lot of the android content is free, and you can get tons of games and apps that you would actually use - i have a barcode scanner, flash light, pregnancy apps, ect.overall if i havent had had all the problems i have i may consider another htc, but think i may go down the iphone root now!!

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I bought this and have never once regretted it. It ticks all the right boxes!!

The HTC Desire S was my replacement to a Nokia and I am very glad I made the upgrade. Like all people I considered an Iphone as it was the safe option but, this HTC was (and still is) the best phone I have ever bought. I have had mine for just over 9 months now and I am very very happy with it. The sharp screen has a very responsive touch sensitive gorilla glass display and the four buttons at the bottom of the device make navigation very easy indeed.As with all smartphones the battery life could be improved and tactics such as reducing screen brightness and closing apps will make the battery last longer, typically the HTC will last for around 2 days with normal use. At around £200-£300 this phone is not the cheapest nor the most expensive and I do think that for a budget of around £300 this phone is a must buy.The Android operating system is as versatile and easy to use as it has always been and is also as quick as you'd expect it to be.As for hardware goes, the Desire S boasts a 5 mega-pixel camera with 720p video recording which can capture high quality snaps with a very powerful flash if need be and store these on either its 1.1GB of internal memory or on a 32GB removable flash card. It also has a front facing camera which can be used for skype calls.Its aluminium casing is strong to the touch and feels very solid, sleek and stylish. At around 130g it is very light but this does not comprimise its strenth.As with all Android phones it is fully customisable with apps from the Android Market provided by Google so, just like an Iphone, the phone can boast games and cool apps to keep the phone up-to-date with the latest trends and games.

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Personally, I'm very fond of it. It's grown on me!

Before purchasing this phone, I owned a HTC Hero. I loved the software, but hated the processing power, and insane lag, hence my purchase of this model.

I considered buying an Iphone instead, but I'm glad I didn't. In the previous generation of android phones, the software was simply too much for the hardware, even at the premium end of the spectrum and, much like with cheaper phones on the market now, the lag was intolerable. The Desire represented the first affordable premium phone that solved this problem, and the desire S is an enhanced version of that, featuring - most importantly to me - much improved battery life. With "minimal" use, I can get 48 hours out of it, but this phone makes itself so invaluable that most days it would be dead with 30 hours. In my opinion that is both tolerable and respectable for the levels of performance it provides.

It handles calls well, even getting a bit of signal in my awful basement flat, and the range of apps that can be acquired for android swells and improves every day. I've never had any problem with app compatibility on this device, unlike with other more niche phones.

Cosmetically, it looks and feels much better in person than in pictures, and has a professional quality about it that phones like the Iphone and the samsung lack.

This phone won't make you look like a manchild at a corporate meeting... although leaving the A-Team as your ring tone, and forgetting to engage silent mode will. No phone can help you with that!

As I have lived with this phone for over a year now, I begin to feel like the screen could potentially be a bit bigger. There is quite a bit of border around the screen, and the phone could be very slightly larger without provoking my small handed rage. That said, this probably helps the phone to achieve its status as immortal. I have dropped this baby so many times in the last 12 months, once while running at considerable pace, and still it survives, no change, no stutter, even the paint is still looking pretty fresh.

Compared to other phones, this thing has thrived in my (clumsy) care, and for that reason, I suspect that my next phone might be a HTC too.

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This would be a 5* review if I didn't have a feeling HTC phones are generally faulty.

The HTC desire S is the 5th phone I have owned and the first ever smartphone. Initial impressions when I got it out of its box, wow! What a phone. The screen is bright and interface is quick. Even now, over half a year on its features impress me.

Straight after I got it as we all do with new phones I had a play around. The camera is good enough to take photos in low light and clear shots at a distance of about 10m. Obviously I don't expect to get a top of the range digital camera with my smartphone but it does the job well and will be fine for all your party camera snapping needs. The next thing I had a play around with was the phones interface. I had already looked into this phone before I bought it and knew about HTC's customisable screen. It really is a USP because I loved changing the theme of my phone to suit my preferanc and adding all the widgets that I wanted on my phone. You think if your going to spend so much money on a phone it might as well be suited to me and that's exactly what this does.

The online features on the phone do what you expect a smartphone to do nowadays with the app store and email both being easy to use. As far as the internet goes it works fine but I found it a little difficult to use with the small spaces for typing and clicked on the wrong thing time and time again.

Now the bad stuff. I got this phone last November and for the first few months it worked faster and better than any phone I have owned but recently it has started to slow down and malfunction. When it started slowing I wiped it's memory to see if that would help and it didn't. Now I could be wrong about this, it could just be my phone that has begun to malfunction but I began to talk to other HTC owners a lot of whom have have the same problem as me. The phone works great for a few months then begins to malfunction. I also looked at online forums where many more people have had the same problem. Whatever is going on though it is not just localised to the HTC desire S. my brother had the same problems with the HTC hero, the first successful HTC smartphone. It leads to suspect that HTC's are generally faulty and what makes this review a 4 instead of 5.